The Philosophy of the Snake
by Mantida
Summary: Sirith Lestrange wants to revenge Slytherin-style on Draco Malfoy, even though Severus Snape does not approve. Alexa Toran and Harry Potter appear in supporting roles. Translation of the 2nd part of the Slytheriad series by Toroj.
1. Chapter 1

_It is a translation of the 2nd part of the 'Slytheriad' series by Toroj. The Polish original ('__Filozofia węża__') and the first part of the series ('__Trick or Treat or Severus Snape's Halloween__') can be found on Toroj's account ( u/584806/toroj)._

The Philosophy of the Snake, or Revenge of the Great Lestrange

(written by Toroj in a moment of madness)

Severus Snape had been teaching for fourteen years, so he was an experienced and cold-blooded teacher, not easily disturbed by trifles – such as, for example, a dreadful scream, which could just be heard outside. He looked calmly in the mirror to check if he was clean shaven, and buttoned up his collar. The next shriek sounded from behind the door. Severus pricked up his ears. He counted to four in his head, allowing the students to settle the matter by themselves. Only his pupils from Slytherin could possibly be present in the dungeon corridor in the morning, and Snape had no intention of subtracting points from his own House. He was not insane yet.

A painful howl let him know that intervention was necessary after all, while there were still any survivors left outside.

He smoothed the sleeves of his robe, grabbed his wand, and forcefully opened the door of his apartment, adopting the 'Beware, the Day of Judgement has thus come' expression. The basement was filled by a black-clad group of young people, and the stone walls reverberated with the sound of many voices, most of them expressing horrified awe and excitement. Everything, however, was outcried by a desperate yell:

' AAAAAAAAAAAH! MYEAR... MYEAR... MYEAR...! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!'

Snape rushed into the cluster of students, pushing them aside. In the very centre of the commotion somebody's hands and legs were coiled, at the first glance in uncountable number. The next glance allowed Snape to identify Vincent Crabbe, lying on his back; across him some other boy was lying, pressed down in his turn by someone smaller, slimmer, but apparently very determined. At that moment both the attacker and the attacked were unrecognizable, since the heads of both were covered by a school robe, upturned in heat of the battle. Gregory Goyle was jerking the assailant by the arm, with the sole result that the cries of the victim acquired increasingly desperate tones.

'You moron! Don't pull her, you'll tear off my ear!'

In a moment Severus put this layer cake together into one logical whole and identified the most probably owner of the washed-up jeans, patched on the seat with a piece of dragon skin. The patch was crossed with an inscription, carelessly scribbled in ink: KISS ME, LOSER.

Snape's face covered itself with a brick-red flush of anger, and, completely losing his self-possession, he whacked his wand straight into the jutted out tail and derisive slogan. And this at last dissolved the situation. Those rising from the floor revealed themselves as the already mentioned Crabbe, Draco Malfoy, pressing his hand to his left ear, and that nightmare of a first-year – Sirith Lestrange – smeared with blood like a vampire. Blood was flowing also between Malfoy's fingers.

'She threw herself at me, Professor! She bit off my ear! She's insane!' howled Malfoy on seeing his Head of House. He looked even paler and more washed-up than usual, his eyes glassy and circular like a shocked rabbit's. Snape concealed his revulsion with some effort, assuming his usual coldly ironic mask. Honestly, the son of Lucius Malfoy could show a bit more of class! Lestrange spat out pink saliva and, disgusted, dried her mouth with her sleeve.

'Mister Malfoy to the hospital wing. The rest to breakfast!' commanded Snape. 'NOW!'

The students departed hastily, stampeding like a herd of horses. One could hear them exchanging first comments about the incident.

'Not you!' At the last moment Snape caught the brat, who was attempting to bolt, by her collar. 'To the study!'

She blinked nervously, but allowed herself to be led. Severus was holding her robe tightly and was feeling more and more idiotic with every passing second. He did not remember ever losing his temper to the degree of striking a student. Even at Potter he had only thrown a jar. (Only once and he had missed, too, so it didn't really count.) He stood the irritating wench before his desk and stooped abruptly over her.

'So...?!' he asked menacingly.

Her expression was set and withdrawn. And again there was a nervous blink, a slight incline of the head that Severus could not stand for two reasons. First, he knew well enough what it meant. Second, he had seen an identical reflex in that bloody Potter, also in the first year: the learned reaction of a child who had been too often slapped in the face. He felt even worse than before. Damn, damn, damn...! What the hell he was supposed to do with this maddening girl whelp?

Lestrange was standing with her eyes fixed on the floor, but her expression was still rebellious. Her right hand was holding her left elbow. Her robe, as usual, was unbuttoned. Severus involuntarily looked down – the brat's trousers were torn on both knees, and the holes were sewn up with thick pink yarn, provocatively tied into bows on the ends. The teacher thought that Lestrange wore her poverty with challenging contempt.

He sat before his desk and pointed his wand to the bookcase at the other end of the room.

'Accio Lestrange's documents!'

A thin leather holder shot through the air, nearly brushing the girl's head. He caught it deftly in the air, opened it, cast a meaningful look at the mutinous student, and read aloud.

'Sirith Herma Lestrange, born on August 31 1984... Bad luck!' He grimaced. 'A hair's-breadth, and I wouldn't need to look at you for the whole year. Permanent residence: Fogbell, under the care of Mafalda Hopkirk Charity Society.'

Snape shut the folder with a loud clap, and demonstratively threw it into the waste paper basket.

'Do you know what that means?' he asked.

The child lifted her head. Snape had vaguely expected a long face and glasses misted with tears of contrition, but Lestrange, pale as death, only made a contemptuous grimace.

'I know,' she retorted. 'It's always the poorer ones who are thrown out, right?'

Snape ignored this.

'Why did you bite a prefect?' He put a special stress on the last word.

She shrugged.

'He's a louse.'

But a rich louse, Severus thought mordantly. If he had been able to, he would have gladly shoved that blasted prefect badge down Malfoy's throat, so that those little pallid eyeballs came up. Unfortunately, his daddy's connections and money still counted for a lot, and the school governing body did not want to withhold such trifling pleasures from the only son of the most generous sponsor.

'Listen, Lestrange...' Severus started again, now in a somewhat calmer voice. 'I don't know where Fogbell lies, but it's surely no metropolis. I rather suppose it's a rotten place on the lines of the infamous London Knockturn Alley. It's much better to come from there than to live there, so if you heard the fog bell, you should heed it and make use of your chance, instead of wasting it in this idiotic fashion!' In spite of his promises to himself made only a minute ago, he shouted the last words, punching the table with his hand. 'Do you think those fancy ladies from the care society will be thrilled at getting an owl carrying news of your scandalous behaviour?'

'Can I sit down?' she asked in reply.

'No!' Snape barked at first, but changed his mind at once and pointed her to the chair. The little one was still pale and she was clutching her elbow; that caveman Goyle must have hurt her. She perched at the very edge, still gaping at the carpet.

'I repeat my question: why did you bite Malfoy? Why the hell did you rush at a fifteen-year-old who outsizes you by a head?'

She bit at her lips as if afraid that Severus would tear a confession from her together with her tongue.

'Even if you don't make a clean breast of it, I will know how it started at any rate. There was no lack of witnesses, and everyone would be willing to tell me. In detail.'

The child gulped.

'He was sneering at me,' she muttered. 'He said... he said I'm a beggar.'

Snape closed his eyes, sighing.

'He said I'm only in Hogwarts because of his father's charity, since it's he who pays for everything here,' mumbled the girl. 'And he was jerking me...'

'Enough,' said the professor quietly. 'Mister Malfoy forgets himself. I'm positive his father the great philanthrope doesn't pay my salary; neither is the cost of meals covered from his donation. However, you may stop eating desserts, if you are so high-minded,' he added ironically.

He pulled the documents out from the basket and put them back on the desk.

'You are suspended for now. How is your hand?'

'Sore.'

'You are to go to Madame Pomfrey, then, and afterwards straight to the Slytherin common room. Don't move from there until the headmaster makes a decision about your case. Now, be off with you. And don't forget to brush your teeth,' drawled Snape. Young Malfoy may be poisonous, he added in his thoughts.

She nodded several times and went out without a word.

'Malfoy...' said Severus with cold fury in the direction of the ceiling. 'Draco Malfoy, pray that your father never goes bankrupt.'


	2. Chapter 2

Sirith's hand was still aching something terrible, but deep down she felt great satisfaction. She had shown that rat that nobody offends Sirith Herma Lestrange and gets away with it. She was also wondering if Sev would really send an owl to Mrs Leumann from the Charity Society. Those old girls from the Society were OK, but there were some things they just didn't get. They didn't understand that if you were a Fogbell kid, you couldn't afford sentiments, even if you were a little blond girl in glasses. Or, rather, especially if you were one. You needed _chrisma_. If you didn't have _chrisma_, bigger kids would push you to the end of the queue. Sev must have understood this, since he hadn't even been shouting that much. Mum, when she had been still alive, had used the word 'masculine'. So Sev was masculine and had enough _chrisma_ for the rest of this bloody school.

Madame Pomfrey, on the other hand, was completely like the ladies from the Society: she was nice, caring, and... not quite worldly-wise. When it had turned out that Goyle had ruptured Siri's tendon, she had made more fuss that it was worth. She called Goyle 'a juvenile bandit' and Sirith 'a poor helpless little girl'. Sirith was inclined to agree with the former, but not quite so much with the latter. She felt as if she could still taste Malfoy in her mouth, even though she had brushed her teeth very carefully. Madame Pomfrey had fixed her hand with a spell, and had put a yellow jelly from pickled murtlap on her painful, swollen muscle. That was funny! In Fogbell, murtlap extract had been added to candies that made your tongue go numb. In Hogwarts, sweets were medicine!

Overall, Siri felt quite nice. Her hand slowly stopped aching, and she could eat her breakfast in the hospital bed, like a princess. Madame Pomfrey had brought her a blancmange, and then went away to her other duties. Sirith scrutinized the pale surface of the pudding, surrounded by a pool of raspberry juice, and sniggered maliciously. Malfoy's face had had an almost identical colour. The girl marked eyes, a nose, and a mouth, twisted in a sad grimace, on the pudding's surface with her spoon.

'I hate you, Malfoy,' she spat out the words with loathing, bending over the plate. 'You swine, you rat... rotter, jellyfish, horned toad... I'll scratch out your peepers and shove them to your yap!' She poked the pudding with the spoon, causing the juice to sprinkle on the blanket, and repeated the action several times with a hardened expression. The pudding was bleeding copiously with raspberry...

'Eghm...' a meaningful grunt could be heard. Sirith froze, with the spoon raised to another murderous stroke. The owner of the biggest _chrisma_ in Hogwarts stood in the half-open door of the sick room. He looked a bit stunned.

Drat, he had had no intention whatsoever of visiting that brat. She was not bedridden, and most probably Poppy would not find any reason to keep her under her wings for too long. But the position of the Head of House and a free half-hour before the lesson with the fifth year (ugh! ouch! Potter and the rest!) obliged him at least to inquire of Pomfrey after his pupil's state of health. Malfoy's state of health was no longer a concern of Severus – the blonde had already turned up by the end of the breakfast, with his ear raspberry pink, but whole.

Severus had not thought at all about the Lestrange imp on his way to the hospital wing (he was setting up the lesson plan in his thoughts), but even if he had been thinking about her, by no means he would have imagined the scene of an eleven year old murderess lacerating some remains with an expression of demented fury on her face, using an ominously shining metal tool to the purpose. Only after a few seconds did the terrified Potions Master realise that the red stains on the bed linen were not blood, and the jumbled mass on the tray was not human brain. With some effort he took a deeper breath and cleared his throat.

Lestrange froze like a photograph from the Daily Prophet. The only thing she lacked was a frame and a caption: JUVENILE MURDERESS.

'Don't you like blancmange, Lestrange?' asked Snape coldly.

'Egh...' she said uncertainly and looked into the plate. 'I think it's still okay.'

And she started to eat calmly and unconcernedly.

Snape sat on a chair by the bed, first scrutinizing it for stains of juice.

'Attacking Malfoy in public was really stupid,' he said in a low voice.

Lestrange shrugged.

'So was I supposed to let him off? Sure, I can see that a bigger half of the seniors toady to him, and the younger ones are all afraid,' she answered, stopping for a moment ingesting blancmange.

'One doesn't say 'a bigger half,' Snape corrected her automatically, knitting his brows. 'And I'm not saying that you should've allowed him to push you over, but that you should have settled the matter differently. Come to me, for example. I'm your Head of House, aren't I?'

Sirith looked at him, her grey eyes cold.

'Yes? And what would you do to him, Prof? Give him a beating?'

'We don't beat students in Hogwarts,' answered Snape in equally cold manner.

'Nooo...?' She rose her eyebrows in imitation of his own ironic expression.

Severus kept his face immobile, but he felt his cheeks reddening with a treacherous flush of embarrassment. Lestrange had hit straight into the bull's eye of his greatest problem. He had hit her, but he could do very little to this spoiled brat as long as his father stood behind him. And, to tell the truth, few things would bring him greater satisfaction than giving Mister Prefect a good thrashing.

'Whatever I would do to him, it would not be biting his ear off,' he said dryly. 'It's not our style, Lestrange. Not out methods. WE are intelligent.'

'We?'

'Imagine a lion attacking a hunter. What happens then?' Snape answered the question with another.

'It eats him?' said Sirith.

'It gets shot,' Snape smiled maliciously. 'That is lion's courage, Gryffindor's courage. They throw themselves in blindly, and get their heads smashed. The snake's philosophy is different. Snakes hide in the grass and bide their time. Snakes are wise and prudent; they bite by surprise and vanish. Why do you think you got sorted in Slytherin? That funny hat doesn't throw dice or sing 'Eeny, meeny, miny, moe...'. If you got into the House of the Snake, it means you have suitable inclinations. So don't behave like a stupid lion cub. If you want to get up to mischief, at least do it in intelligent manner.'

Sirith nodded slowly, looking at him with something close to idolatry, which made him feel uneasy. Why the hell was he actually giving this lecture to a stupid eleven-year-old?

'Aha, so if I want a revenge on Malfoy, I should do it in intelligent manner, and not get caught?'

Snape gritted his teeth surreptitiously.

'I was speaking theoretically. Don't you dare to take revenge on Malfoy! To take revenge on Malfoy is stupid and dangerous. And, at any rate, how would you manage it, with his overgrown companions by his side all the time?'

'I still had a bite off his eat,' retorted Siri with inexorable logic and unconcealed satisfaction in her voice.

'Right,' drawled Severus. 'And you are sitting now with a compress on your arm and suspended from school. Plus, given the right circumstances, Goyle might have torn your hand off.'

'Like a troll...' mumbled Siri under her nose.

'I've never been in favour of physical violence. Psychological methods have always been my preferred venue, dear child,' said Snape sourly, rising from the chair. 'And by the way... You've got a week detention in the Potions laboratory. Perhaps cleaning test tubes will calm you down somewhat.'

'With you? Super, neat and cool!' the girl exclaimed with elation. 'Thank you!'

Snape was struck dumb. He managed to leave the room with a stony face, but in a state of mental paralysis. Only in the corridor did he begin to breathe deeply. He was aching for a smoke. With a manic expression he started to suck on a pencil he had taken out of his pocket. He had a terrible premonition that this imp would manage something the Dark Lord, the Golden Trio and several generations of brats had failed to accomplish – she would completely destroy his mental health.

He was also wondering about something else. Of course, there was nothing frightening about the sight of a brat abusing a plateful of pudding. The whole situation was actually comical. Severus had not know himself, at first, what the cause of the cold sweat running down his back had been. Still, he felt a throbbing pain of the bad memory somewhere close to his heart. Lestrange... Naturally, there were hundreds of Lestranges in England alone, and probably thousands in France. Sirith Herma Lestrange from Fogbell did not have anything to do with THOSE Lestranges. She could not have! Could she? But still for two nightmarish seconds he could see another face superimposed on the childish face of that terrible wench – a face of a mature woman, bearing an identical expression of fury and insanity. He knew now of whom she reminded him: she was a blond version of Bellatrix Lestrange, imprisoned since sixteen years in Azkaban. Thankfully, simple arithmetics gave the obvious, logical, and highly comforting answer – she was not HER daughter.

Otherwise, he would not have advanced two knuts for Draco Malfoy's life.

_To be continued_


	3. Chapter 3

Unfortunately, Sirith had to make up for all lessons she had missed that day. That was why she was still sitting in the common room at ten in the evening, copying deadly boring notes from the History of Magic. Slytherin small fry started to crawl away to their dormitories; even a spirited game of Exploding Snap ended up, accompanied by hearty yawning. In the end, the only people still staying in the common room were Siri and a red-headed girl from the fifth year, cramming doggedly to OWLs. Siri was glancing at her with involuntary awe. Alexa Toran was certainly a well-built young woman, considering her age. She was playing in the Quidditch team as a Beater, and her killer strokes and scathing tongue assured that even the Malfoy's fanclub treated her with reluctant respect. Her nickname El Toro spoke for itself. So greater was therefore Sirith's surprise when she heard:

'Hey, kid... catch!'

She managed to catch some item in the air and only afterwards she identified it as a chocolate bar. El Toro looked at her with favour.

'You'd make a decent Seeker. You've got quick reactions.'

There was an ant painted on the chocolate bar's wrapping, but Alexa was nibbling at an identical sweet, so Siri decided to taste her own. It turned out to be rather sour.

'You want anything from me?' she asked. Nothing came free in life.

El Toro shrugged and smiled somewhat mockingly.

'Nothing for now. That snot Malfoy got on my nerves since a long time. Not only a bigmouth, but a rotten player too. He bought his place in the team for seven Nimbuses. Marcus and I still wonder from time to time if the prize was not set too low. He sits on a broom like a frog on a wire.'

Sirith sniggered maliciously, sputtering formic crumbs around.

'We are impressed, at any rate,' added Alexa, moving her eyebrows in a meaningful manner. 'Nobody has trashed him so far, although many would like to. The Weasleys, for example...'

'Nobody?' marvelled Sirith.

'No student, that is,' the girl clarified, stretching herself comfortably on a sofa. 'There was of course that affair with old Moody...' She burst suddenly into laughter and could not calm herself for a long while. 'It was SO BEAUTIFUL!'

Siri, intrigued, could not turn her eyes from the older Slytherin girl. To tell the truth, she was gratified that one of the 'seniors' paid attention to her. After all, El Toro was really _someone_, and here she was treating a first year with sweets and a friendly chat. El Toro had _chrisma_, too, although obviously not as much as Sev.

'What old Moody?' she reminded her.

'Well, last year we had the Defence classes with Alastor Moody, a retired Auror. Malfoy peeved him in some fashion. I haven't seen how it started, and afterwards everybody was telling something else... At any rate, when I came in, Moody was playing yo-yo with a white ferret. It was squeaking something terrible. McGonagall rushed in and bit his head off for maltreating a dumb beast. And then it turned out it was a transfigured Malfoy. When they lifted the spell, he looked like a wet rag and was half suffocated.'

'Cool,' said Siri with glee. Her vivid imagination at once projected the scene before her eyes.

At the same moment the entrance portal opened in the opposite wall, and the Head of House appeared in it.

'Bed, Lestrange,' he ordered dryly. 'It's already past ten. Toran, I have found this book on Modification Spells for you. Take notes tomorrow.' He gave the book had hold to the girl.

'Thank you, professor.'

Severus's black eyes turned again to Sirith, who was collecting her handbooks.

'Remember, tomorrow at four, in the Potion room,' he reminded her and left.

'What 'at four'?' Alexa asked absent-mindedly, leafing through the book and walking slowly in the direction of the dormitory door.

'I got a detention for Malfoy,' the girl explained.

'Don't be afraid, Sev only always looks furious.'

'I know,' she answered.

Lying in the quiet bedroom and listening to breaths of her sleeping neighbours, Sirith Lestrange was gazing in the dark canopy over her bed and kept imagining, over and over again, Malfoy turned into a ferret – skipping at the end of the wand like a furry toy on an elastic. She covered her mouth with her hands to prevent herself from bursting into loud laughter. How frightened and angry he must have been! Sirith recalled what Sev was telling her about snakes in grass, and her head started to assemble a scheme. A Slytherin scheme.

_To be continued..._

_...if I can find a beta-reader. So, if anyone is reading this and is willing, please contact me. Some reviews would be welcome, too._


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